Burdensand Bargains in Higher Education
AS ONE Of the many different things which our economy produces, higher education is in some ways like other things we produce—such as automobiles, and clothing, and color television sets. Like them, higher education cannot be produced without using up scarce resources, and having more higher education means someone must have less of other things which might have been produced instead. In other respects, however, higher education is much different, and the differences raise crucial issues for decisions on financing it.
Higher education is both a private and a public good. While it gives significant benefits to individuals who have it, it also has social benefits, in the sense that the education of one man improves the quality of life for others. Governments have long felt obliged to induce the production of higher education by offering a public subsidy, evidently fearing that if they failed to do some of the social benefits would be lost.
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